Zamtan



The crowd who waited 2 1/2 hours to see us at Zamtan


I'm skipping over to Zambia now with some stories from there.  Every stop is always full of surprises!



We stopped at a poor little township called Zamtan coming back from Chingola.  One of our most faithful Kafwa, Angela, lives there.  She attended our January training for Child Support Specialists and was one of the biggest advocates for caring for the orphans.  She's raising an orphaned niece that she's had for 4 years.  We arrived at Zamtan 2 1/2 hours later than we had told them and were greeted by over 200 people who had waited patiently for us.



Two of the school children

Angela said after the January training she decided to start a school in her community for the kids who could not afford the government school.  The school opened in May and she has 51 children enrolled - all taught by one teacher at the same time!  The kids were all there to show us what they had already learned and we were duly impressed.  They sang their version of a little ABC song with gusto, demonstrated their knowledge of English with a cute little action song about sitting, standing, jumping, etc. under a banana tree, and wrote a letter of the alphabet on a crude board (they have no chalk board) as their teacher asked them to.



Angela showing the School Attendance Book



They haven't organized with school committees, etc. yet but are planning to do so.  They started with a meeting for the whole community and the locals thought they could pay 5000 Kw (about $1) per month for the school.  They have already paid some but I would be amazed if this poor little community can maintain a payment schedule of that magnitude.

Angela also has a support group going for the orphans and has 32 children attending evening sessions.  Angela is a quiet lady with a ready smile and a big heart who does amazing things!  We will watch their progress and see if they maintain their enthusiasm for the school.  If so, this is probably another HealthEd Connect program waiting in the wings for future development.